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Countering Midlane Pushing Champions

I'm fairly new to this game, so I'm running into champions like Morgana, Mordekaiser, and Malzehar for the first time. What do they all have in common?

They generally push mid very hard with their farming.

When playing AP mid in general, what kinds of things can you do to deal with champions that do this? I already know ganks are good, but besides that? Being stuck farming near your tower usually results in them having more CS as well as giving them opportunities to shop and gank other lanes.

Mainly just ganks. If you really can't get any, then your best bet is probably to just push back harder, though that's champ dependent.
Also, harrass them, so that if they keep on pushing they pay for it with mana and health they need against you.

Generally I try to judge their playing style and adjust my own accordingly.

If they play aggressively and constantly try to zone me out, I use that to my advantage by baiting them into a trap. If they play passively and tend to hang around the back, I use that to my advantage and zone them out to minimize their CS/effectiveness/pushing. If they push the lane REALLY hard, but leave me mostly alone, I hang in back and pick off the melee minions, and then save my spells and basic attacks for the caster minions at my turret, where a single shot from the tower and then a spell usually does the trick.

The important thing against heavy pushers is to stay with or ahead of them in CS, so once you get your full burst combo prepared, you can leap at them from one of the sides and smash their face.

I find the best thing to do is to either call for ganks or to push back yourself. If you're playing a champ who can't push easily and the jungler won't come you just have to do your best to last hit under the tower.

Push back as hard as you can, and ask your jungler if you can steal his wraiths when they come up while your lane is pushed. Junglers usually don't mind as long as you don't steal their first wraiths, because they may need those to hit a certain level or gold amount in a timely fashion.

I'm fairly new to this game, so I'm running into champions like Morgana, Mordekaiser, and Malzehar for the first time. What do they all have in common?

They generally push mid very hard with their farming.

When playing AP mid in general, what kinds of things can you do to deal with champions that do this? I already know ganks are good, but besides that? Being stuck farming near your tower usually results in them having more CS as well as giving them opportunities to shop and gank other lanes.

I actually disagree with this statement and I'll give you some pointers that helped me.

There are champs and combinations of champs for bottom lane that can push really hard, if they are doing that, then most of the time they are at a disadvantage depending on who you are playing and how well u can judge minions health.

You mentioned you just started, and I don't want to make this an EXTREMELY long read so I will try to sum things up

- Melee minions can take 2 turret hits without dying (typically with near full health, one auto attack needed to kill after)
- Ranged minions can take 1 turret hit without dying (and then two auto attacks are needed to kill them)

From experience you learn how to adjust and auto attack and last hit under the turret. I do really well at this and just wait patiently for the jungler to comedown because it's an easy lane to gank.

What also takes time is learning to auto attack the minions to get their health to a point where the turret needs one hit before u can auto attack. Also, dont be afraid to take a bit of dmg from the minions to obtain this goal. The champs you listed are a pain in the neck, so I know how you feel and the frustration, but at the same time, when they're pushing they aren't getting all the last hits and you can't get ganked unless you get dove on early, which would be dumb of them.

This happened to me recently as I had a malz who wasn't saving his mana and jsut spamming and pushing. Now to be blunt, the other players on my team weren't very good, but I was vlad and actually ended up out farming him, despite being under the turret. Didn't get a gank because he was too low leveled and the other lanes were losing too. In that case, stuff happens.

What I can tell you, because I want to tell a community who might care, is I ended up with more farm then our top and bottom lanes combined.

Farming under the turret takes time, but you need to depend on your jungler to come and bail you out. If the jungler isnt a threat, then they have no reason to stop pushing.

On a side note, some people don't realize getting someone to flash or back off the lane is a successful gank! You don't need a kill for a gank to be considered successful as long as it helps your teammate farm and makes your next gank easier

Nanuuk Malz is one of the best champs in the game for denying you farm under your turret. The combination of MV bouncing around, well-placed void zones and long range aoe silence nukes can make it a nightmare to get your last hits in. After a few items he can do that WHILE maintaining his mana and his farm. This is all balanced out by the fact that he's squishy and horribly vulnerable to good jungle ganks.

A lot of the pushing champs can make even hiding under your tower hard. Malzahar, Morg, Brand, Cass, Oriana etc all have AoE damage that can really punish you even from there. My suggestion would be to play a jungle any time your team doesn't have one, rather than "I MID" at the very start of the game.